Death in the Pot…

‘Happy birthday Daddy!’ Jennifer squealed as she gave me a bear hug. I tossed her upwards and she erupted in peals of laughter. I had rushed in from my night shift to pick her up from Sunday school and as I ushered her into the car, she handed me a piece of paper.

‘Here’s your birthday present. No! Don’t open it yet. When we get home to mummy.’ Her face furrowed and she gave me her chastising look.

‘Daddy you missed Sunday school today. Why? Because you are always working. Night and Day!’

This was vintage Jenny. Asking the questions and providing answers at the same time.

‘Anyway’, she continued, fastening her seat belt, ‘Today‘s topic was interesting. Our teacher told us a bible story. I liked the part where he said. ‘O man of God, there is death in the pot!’’

She cocked her head to one side and made an inquisitive face for full effect.

‘Daddy, how can there be death in a pot?’

 

*****

 

Beads of perspiration had already formed on my forehead as I grasped the steering wheel and moved the car out of the parking lot thinking how best to answer my little girl and about events at another time and place.

I remembered my father clutching his chest on the hospital bed as he gasped his final breath. He had motioned for me to come closer in an attempt to mouth the words.

‘J..Jo..Joseph…Beware! Th..There is d.de..death…in the p..po..pot…’

‘Papa’, I had cried, ‘How can that be possible?’

The cold, lifeless eyes had no answers for me. Years later my uncle Thomas in a show of supremacy confessed to lacing his drink with a lethal potion.

 

*****

 

I loosened my tie as I adjusted the air conditioning vent. I caught my daughter’s eye in the mirror and she giggled.

‘Daddy, this your potbelly is growing bigger every day. Are you sure you can eat the potatoes mummy will cook for us in her big pot when we get home?’

My daughter had in a single paragraph uttered words containing ‘pot’ more times than I had been afraid to consider since Papa died. I had since created enough synonyms for the word to last me a lifetime. Surely this was a sign, even for one who didn’t take matters of faith seriously.

 

*****

 

The van ahead braked suddenly and I swerved to avoid smashing into it, ploughing into a dangerous looking pothole and losing my front tyre in the process.

We alighted and I surveyed the damage while eyeing the crater suspiciously. My stomach voiced its displeasure at being delayed for its birthday feast. I figured Papa’s warning, the potbelly, potatoes, pot and pothole and whatever omen they portended could wait while I changed tyres.

‘Not to worry dear, let’s get some stones to steady the car’.

We had barely collected the stones when a container-laden trailer at top speed happened on the exact spot and in trying to maneuver itself tipped over, disgorging its contents to impact on the very spot we had been standing on.

Jennifer shrieked and clutched onto me in fright and I felt goosebumps in the sweltering heat. The car was a write-off and we were lucky to be alive. Had we delayed by seconds it would have been a different tale.

It could not have been more surprising that the truck had been conveying potables.

 

*****

 

Later that night as I tucked her into bed, she handed me the paper which had fallen from my pocket earlier. Apparently she had gone to great lengths to create an artistic impression depicting our family.

‘Happy birthday again Daddy. What do you think we should say to the death that lives in a pothole?’

I smiled as I flicked the light switch,

‘Not today dear. Not today’.